Wall Observer BTC/USD - Bitcoin price movement tracking & discussion

[JorgeStolfi]

New investors are not putting that much money into the system per day. Not all coins are sold

This seems to be a common folklore, but is it true?  

I recall an interview with a Chinese miner, made many months ago, where he said how much he kept of what he mined.  Unfortunately I don't recall whether it was 50% or 10%.  Are there other data points?

Assuming that it was 50%, and the guy was telling the truth, and he has been able to keep that fraction in spite of the falling price, and he is representative of all miners, even so the miners must be taking ~450'000 $ out of the system, every day.

[ new investors ] would not be happy to continue to once the word is out that bitcoin is broken which it would.

Well, I believe that bitcoin is broken in that respect: mining will inevitably become centralized, ane eventually it will be controlled by a cartel of miners.  And the cartel can  do arbitrarily nasty things: not just dictate the minimum fee, or starve competing miners (which everybody knows that they can do, right?), but even force all users and services to accept changes in the protocol -- such as postponing the next halving.  That is one reason why I am skeptical about its longterm success.

(By the way, they could postpone the next halving but speed up all the subsequent ones, so as to preserve the 21 M limit that people seem to be so attached to.)

Discussions of the 51% attack usually start with the tacit assumption that the attacker wants to destroy bitcoin, or do some petty crime like double-spending, that would immediately destroy it.  However, cartels and monopolies do not get created to destroy their business, but to maximize their revenue -- usually by charging far more than they could charge in a free market.  

[Wandererfromthenorth]

This guy makes good points (read the other posts also):


https://twitter.com/patio11/status/583697371378257920

[fichtn12345]

Who cares about miners? They have no vote and nothing to say.
Relevant are only the 3 till 5 admins/owners of the biggest mining pools. They decide.

no they don't

the moment they "decide" something stupid everyone leaves the pool

this is why i find it silly to say big mining pools are a threat to bitcoins decentralization

pools have to act how there users what them to act or they won't use that pool, the users have all the power.

hmmm... same power as 'the consumers have all the power, not the big companies'?
i guess it would be too cool if there was no marketing (-lies)...

[ensurance982]

This guy makes good points (read the other posts also):



https://twitter.com/patio11/status/583697371378257920





Basically, bitcoiners don't know how remittances actually work.

Does it actually matter as long as the remittance service works and the people get their money from point a to point b?

[adamstgBit]

This guy makes good points (read the other posts also):



https://twitter.com/patio11/status/583697371378257920





Basically, bitcoiners don't know how remittances actually work.

the problem with all these stupid arguments is that they're all BS

the point is yesterday someone on the other side of the globe, paid me some BTC in exchange for some physical coins.

The transaction was instant, painless, and at no cost.

bitcoin works.

[bassclef]

Jorge, if a minig cartel ever threatened to change the rules of Bitcoin, the value would plummet as everyone jumped ship to a new coin. Why would they ever do it knowing that it would devalue their assets? Miners want bitcoins and need them to have value, or it's a wasteful endeavor.

Btw, have you bought any bitcoins yet? Have you set up a minig rig to see how the incentive structure works?

Talk is cheap.

[dewdeded]

Jorge, if a minig cartel ever threatened to change the rules of Bitcoin, the value would plummet as everyone jumped ship to a new coin. Why would they ever do it knowing that it would devalue their assets?

This is a nonsense answer to me. Why would they have to threat anything?

They CAN do many different detectable and undetectable manipulations, with or without violating Bitcoins rules. There is no need to change the rules.

They could manipulate: TX relaying, block relaying, not mining TX they dont like (to low fees, unwanted origin), banning of nodes, logging & spying on users, implement black-lists, ..., etc.

[ChartBuddy]

Coin
Explanation

[KFR]

Smart people here honestly still giving this Stolfi character oxygen?  

One mad man shouting at the inevitable tide is not worthy of your attentions.  

P.S. CCMF. 

[Brewins]

Jorge, if a minig cartel ever threatened to change the rules of Bitcoin, the value would plummet as everyone jumped ship to a new coin. Why would they ever do it knowing that it would devalue their assets?

This is a nonsense answer to me. Why would they have to threat anything?

They CAN do many different detectable and undetectable manipulations, with or without violating Bitcoins rules. There is no need to change the rules.

They could manipulate: TX relaying, block relaying, not mining TX they dont like (to low fees, unwanted origin), banning of nodes, logging & spying on users, implement black-lists, ..., etc.

I doubt  that such changes would remain undetected by the whole community.

Sooner or later someone would see them, make it public and people would leave the pool.

[bassclef]

Jorge, if a minig cartel ever threatened to change the rules of Bitcoin, the value would plummet as everyone jumped ship to a new coin. Why would they ever do it knowing that it would devalue their assets?

This is a nonsense answer to me. Why would they have to threat anything?

They CAN do many different detectable and undetectable manipulations, with or without violating Bitcoins rules. There is no need to change the rules.

They could manipulate: TX relaying, block relaying, not mining TX they dont like (to low fees, unwanted origin), banning of nodes, spying on users, etc.

They are free to do any of that now. But a pool that does won't see as much revenue because no one will want to point their miners there, so again there is no incentive.

[sporket]

This guy makes good points (read the other posts also):



https://twitter.com/patio11/status/583697371378257920





Basically, bitcoiners don't know how remittances actually work.

the problem with all these stupid arguments is that they're all BS

the point is yesterday someone on the other side of the globe, paid me some BTC in exchange for some physical coins.

The transaction was instant, painless, and at no cost.

bitcoin works.

ADAM!  IT"S CAPLOCK, NOT DOUBLE_SPACING, THAT'S COOL ON CRUISE CONTROL!  
Why

do

Bitcoiners

start

double

spacing

their

posts

when

they

have

no

logical

arguments,

anyhow?

Some sort of psyops trick, wearing me down by making me scroll?  Trying to wear out the scroll wheel on my mouse, hmm?

[inca]

Jorge, if a minig cartel ever threatened to change the rules of Bitcoin, the value would plummet as everyone jumped ship to a new coin. Why would they ever do it knowing that it would devalue their assets?

This is a nonsense answer to me. Why would they have to threat anything?

They CAN do many different detectable and undetectable manipulations, with or without violating Bitcoins rules. There is no need to change the rules.

They could manipulate: TX relaying, block relaying, not mining TX they dont like (to low fees, unwanted origin), banning of nodes, spying on users, etc.

They are free to do any of that now. But a pool that does won't see as much revenue because no one will want to point their miners there, so again there is no incentive.

Exactly. These are all completely pointless debates. No mining pool will risk upsetting their income.

A malicious 51% attack would result in immediate changes being implemented by a consensus driven by protecting bitcoin by every other player.

[sporket]

...
One mad man shouting at the inevitable tide is not worthy of your attentions.  

Let me help you with your mixed metaphors:
The phrase you meant to use is "casting pearls before swine."
You're welcome.

[JorgeStolfi]

if the need presents itself the more probable outcome would be to change the hashing algorithm use cpu's and kill all asic behemoths and adjust the difficulty to the new hardware scale than what Jorge suggest.

You cannot kill a cryptocurrency, remember?  

If the idealists do as above, there will be a "rebel bitcoin" with a tiny mining network, and the "cartel's bitcoin", with all the old hashpower (since the ASIC miners would not have other choice than to mine it).  Guess which one will keep most of the value of the original bitcoins.  It is like the Captain "defeating" a mutiny by taking off alone in a small lifeboat, and declaring it to be the real ship.

Moreover, even the rebels will still have their coins waiting for them on the cartel's chain; so why would they not sell and trade them? Ignoring those coins would be their loss, not the cartel's.

you forget that they would instantly have over 51% of the network closer to 100% and there would be no confidence as to the transactions integrity.

BTW what I stated was the outcome to a real proposal if the odd chance that the present mining algorithm would have been compromised via a back door. In essence making all existing ASIC use for BTC obsolete and make the old BTC network compromised and useless.

I don't understand the first paragraph.  Yes, the rebels will control 100% of their puny all-CPU network (which the cartel could probably squash by renting some could computing for a couple million dollars, if it cared to).  But 100% of the old hashpower will be mining the cartel's 25 M chain, just as before the fork; and the rebels cannot do anything against them.  Each client would have to either upgrade to the cartel's software, or upgrade to the rebel's software (or to both, after cloning the wallet); clients who keep the original software will be unable to use their coins.

Yes, this is called "Red Button plan" or something like that.  It is not a defense, or even a deterrent like the nuclear mutually assured destruction; it is just a ridiculous form of suicide.

In other words. If the conditions present themselves the btc blockchain network and participants will make the most prudent choice that will have majority consensus. No one given the option would eat spoiled food or in this case trade on a defunct chain.

The problem is that power is asymmetric: a small group of miners can block the network and hold all users' coins hostage, whereas no group of users can stop the miners from doing it without hurting themselves a lot more.

According to the attack plan outlined (which is just one possibility), the 21 M chain would become defunct immediately after the fork, while the 25 M chain would continue working without a glitch. 

Exchanges that would fail to move over would cause panic in the ALT coin space as exchanges would not know as to the authenticity of the BTC being traded for alts effectively making alts valueless.

There would be no confusion, because any exchange that fails to switch will have its wallets frozen and all BTC deposits and withdrawals blocked.  The coins that are inside the exchanges can be traded normally, because the trades do not involve the blockchain.  When the exchange switches to the 25 M chain, it will find its hot and cold wallets waiting there, and it will be able to execute withdrawals in that chain.  Clients then will have to upgrade in order to use the coins withdrawn.

If the attack succeeds, life will continue in the 25 M chain almost as if there had been no fork.  If the attack fails, and all miners go back to the 21 M chain, people will be able to use that chain again, but their accounts will be reset to the pre-fork state.  Thus, any payments made using the 25 M chain will be cancelled, and there will be real losses (like the double spend against OKPay in the 2013 fork).  This will be another reason why most everybody will want the attack to succeed, once it has been sustained for a day or so and enough people have used the 25 M chain.

There is a third possible outcome: the cartel stops jamming the 21 M chain (e..g because of defections, or "hero miners" coming to the rescue), but only part of the miners go back to it.  In that case the two versions of bitcoin will remain viable; each copy of one's coins can be spent or moved independently of the other copy.  The original price should also split between the two, and the miners will migrate between the chains until either alternative is just as lucrative to mine as the other.  (I wonder if they can be merge-mined?)

[tarmi]

Jorge, if a minig cartel ever threatened to change the rules of Bitcoin, the value would plummet as everyone jumped ship to a new coin. Why would they ever do it knowing that it would devalue their assets?

This is a nonsense answer to me. Why would they have to threat anything?

They CAN do many different detectable and undetectable manipulations, with or without violating Bitcoins rules. There is no need to change the rules.

They could manipulate: TX relaying, block relaying, not mining TX they dont like (to low fees, unwanted origin), banning of nodes, logging & spying on users, implement black-lists, ..., etc.

I doubt  that such changes would remain undetected by the whole community.

Sooner or later someone would see them, make it public and people would leave the pool.

I can tell you that one of the admins of eligius accused one of the biggest miners there for withholding blocks.

they cleaned out his account. 200 btc.

never returned to him nor other honest miners in the pool. it is very difficult to prove withholding attack, but they did it somehow (nobody knows actually how) and kept the money.  

so in the end it comes to the admins of big pools. they have the power, yes. and like that guy said in the tweets and like everybody witnessed it with a version of a client that contained a serious bug (not remember which version), they will solve it by themselves on IRC. meaning behind closed doors.

 

this post is sponsored and brought to you by JP Morgan.  

[Sitarow]

if the need presents itself the more probable outcome would be to change the hashing algorithm use cpu's and kill all asic behemoths and adjust the difficulty to the new hardware scale than what Jorge suggest.

You cannot kill a cryptocurrency, remember?  

If the idealists do as above, there will be a "rebel bitcoin" with a tiny mining network, and the "cartel's bitcoin", with all the old hashpower (since the ASIC miners would not have other choice than to mine it).  Guess which one will keep most of the value of the original bitcoins.  It is like the Captain "defeating" a mutiny by taking off alone in a small lifeboat, and declaring it to be the real ship.

Moreover, even the rebels will still have their coins waiting for them on the cartel's chain; so why would they not sell and trade them? Ignoring those coins would be their loss, not the cartel's.

you forget that they would instantly have over 51% of the network closer to 100% and there would be no confidence as to the transactions integrity.

BTW what I stated was the outcome to a real proposal if the odd chance that the present mining algorithm would have been compromised via a back door. In essence making all existing ASIC use for BTC obsolete and make the old BTC network compromised and useless.

I don't understand the first paragraph.  Yes, the rebels will control 100% of their puny all-CPU network (which the cartel could probably squash by renting some could computing for a couple million dollars, if it cared to).  But 100% of the old hashpower will be mining the cartel's 25 M chain, just as before the fork; and the rebels cannot do anything against them.  Each client would have to either upgrade to the cartel's software, or upgrade to the rebel's software (or to both, after cloning the wallet); clients who keep the original software will be unable to use their coins.

Yes, this is called "Red Button plan" or something like that.  It is not a defense, or even a deterrent like the nuclear mutually assured destruction; it is just a ridiculous form of suicide.

In other words. If the conditions present themselves the btc blockchain network and participants will make the most prudent choice that will have majority consensus. No one given the option would eat spoiled food or in this case trade on a defunct chain.

The problem is that power is asymmetric: a small group of miners can block the network and hold all users' coins hostage, whereas no group of users can stop the miners from doing it without hurting themselves a lot more.

According to the attack plan outlined (which is just one possibility), the 21 M chain would become defunct immediately after the fork, while the 25 M chain would continue working without a glitch.  

Exchanges that would fail to move over would cause panic in the ALT coin space as exchanges would not know as to the authenticity of the BTC being traded for alts effectively making alts valueless.

There would be no confusion, because any exchange that fails to switch will have its wallets frozen and all BTC deposits and withdrawals blocked.  The coins that are inside the exchanges can be traded normally, because the trades do not involve the blockchain.  When the exchange switches to the 25 M chain, it will find its hot and cold wallets waiting there, and it will be able to execute withdrawals in that chain.  Clients then will have to upgrade in order to use the coins withdrawn.

If the attack succeeds, life will continue in the 25 M chain almost as if there had been no fork.  If the attack fails, and all miners go back to the 21 M chain, people will be able to use that chain again, but their accounts will be reset to the pre-fork state.  Thus, any payments made using the 25 M chain will be cancelled, and there will be real losses (like the double spend against OKPay in the 2013 fork).  This will be another reason why most everybody will want the attack to succeed, once it has been sustained for a day or so and enough people have used the 25 M chain.

There is a third possible outcome: the cartel stops jamming the 21 M chain (e..g because of defections, or "hero miners" coming to the rescue), but only part of the miners go back to it.  In that case the two versions of bitcoin will remain viable; each copy of one's coins can be spent or moved independently of the other copy.  The original price should also split between the two, and the miners will migrate between the chains until either alternative is just as lucrative to mine as the other.  (I wonder if they can be merge-mined?)

I question your power of reasoning. You have failed to understand what consensus is when you refer to participants as rebels. ASIC tech and the "cartel" are at the mercy of the network participants not the other way around. I am starting to see what people have been talking about.

In essence making all existing ASIC use for BTC obsolete and make the old BTC network compromised and useless. BTC network used to fund accounts would be under suspicion of double spent coins due to the "cartel" having over 51% and closer to 100% network control.

BTC network as it was known will have become defunct.

[nanobrain]

if the need presents itself the more probable outcome would be to change the hashing algorithm use cpu's and kill all asic behemoths and adjust the difficulty to the new hardware scale than what Jorge suggest.

You cannot kill a cryptocurrency, remember? 

If the idealists do as above, there will be a "rebel bitcoin" with a tiny mining network, and the "cartel's bitcoin", with all the old hashpower (since the ASIC miners would not have other choice than to mine it).  Guess which one will keep most of the value of the original bitcoins.  It is like the Captain "defeating" a mutiny by taking off alone in a small lifeboat, and declaring it to be the real ship.

Moreover, even the rebels will still have their coins waiting for them on the cartel's chain; so why would they not sell and trade them? Ignoring those coins would be their loss, not the cartel's.

you forget that they would instantly have over 51% of the network closer to 100% and there would be no confidence as to the transactions integrity.

BTW what I stated was the outcome to a real proposal if the odd chance that the present mining algorithm would have been compromised via a back door. In essence making all existing ASIC use for BTC obsolete and make the old BTC network compromised and useless.

I don't understand the first paragraph.  Yes, the rebels will control 100% of their puny all-CPU network (which the cartel could probably squash by renting some could computing for a couple million dollars, if it cared to).  But 100% of the old hashpower will be mining the cartel's 25 M chain, just as before the fork; and the rebels cannot do anything against them.  Each client would have to either upgrade to the cartel's software, or upgrade to the rebel's software (or to both, after cloning the wallet); clients who keep the original software will be unable to use their coins.

Yes, this is called "Red Button plan" or something like that.  It is not a defense, or even a deterrent like the nuclear mutually assured destruction; it is just a ridiculous form of suicide.

In other words. If the conditions present themselves the btc blockchain network and participants will make the most prudent choice that will have majority consensus. No one given the option would eat spoiled food or in this case trade on a defunct chain.

The problem is that power is asymmetric: a small group of miners can block the network and hold all users' coins hostage, whereas no group of users can stop the miners from doing it without hurting themselves a lot more.

According to the attack plan outlined (which is just one possibility), the 21 M chain would become defunct immediately after the fork, while the 25 M chain would continue working without a glitch. 

Exchanges that would fail to move over would cause panic in the ALT coin space as exchanges would not know as to the authenticity of the BTC being traded for alts effectively making alts valueless.

There would be no confusion, because any exchange that fails to switch will have its wallets frozen and all BTC deposits and withdrawals blocked.  The coins that are inside the exchanges can be traded normally, because the trades do not involve the blockchain.  When the exchange switches to the 25 M chain, it will find its hot and cold wallets waiting there, and it will be able to execute withdrawals in that chain.  Clients then will have to upgrade in order to use the coins withdrawn.

If the attack succeeds, life will continue in the 25 M chain almost as if there had been no fork.  If the attack fails, and all miners go back to the 21 M chain, people will be able to use that chain again, but their accounts will be reset to the pre-fork state.  Thus, any payments made using the 25 M chain will be cancelled, and there will be real losses (like the double spend against OKPay in the 2013 fork).  This will be another reason why most everybody will want the attack to succeed, once it has been sustained for a day or so and enough people have used the 25 M chain.

There is a third possible outcome: the cartel stops jamming the 21 M chain (e..g because of defections, or "hero miners" coming to the rescue), but only part of the miners go back to it.  In that case the two versions of bitcoin will remain viable; each copy of one's coins can be spent or moved independently of the other copy.  The original price should also split between the two, and the miners will migrate between the chains until either alternative is just as lucrative to mine as the other.  (I wonder if they can be merge-mined?)

Setting out rational arguments is going to get you a whole heap of love Jorge.

[Wandererfromthenorth]

Jorge, if a minig cartel ever threatened to change the rules of Bitcoin, the value would plummet as everyone jumped ship to a new coin. Why would they ever do it knowing that it would devalue their assets?

This is a nonsense answer to me. Why would they have to threat anything?

They CAN do many different detectable and undetectable manipulations, with or without violating Bitcoins rules. There is no need to change the rules.

They could manipulate: TX relaying, block relaying, not mining TX they dont like (to low fees, unwanted origin), banning of nodes, spying on users, etc.

They are free to do any of that now. But a pool that does won't see as much revenue because no one will want to point their miners there, so again there is no incentive.

Exactly. These are all completely pointless debates. No mining pool will risk upsetting their income.

A malicious 51% attack would result in immediate changes being implemented by a consensus driven by protecting bitcoin by every other player.

But what about this?

http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1qqmr4/ghashiocexio_and_doublespending_against_betcoin/

Or this?
https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/239bj1/doublespending_unconfirmed_transactions_is_a_lot/


All this talk about how "miners would never attack the network because that would destroy confidence in the blockchain and they would stop making money" is kinda bogus IMHO.


If double spends happen the bitcoin community just looks the other way and pretends that never happened.

Are you sure "miners have no incentive to perform double spend attacks" if all that happens after a double spend (that doesn't seem that easy to investigate into too apparently) is some posts on reddit trying to figure out what the hell happened and bitcoiners just forgetting about it?

[Ask Ken About Love]

Gentlemen, gentlemen, I beg you!  Why so much ado about nothing?  Why not channel our energies into discussing something more contemporary, why get so wound up about a dated, dying fad currency no one else cares about?  

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